Summertime is time for fun, relaxation, and enjoyment and with so many great festivals and events in Pierce and Thurston Counties, we have lots of choices as to how we can spend our precious hours getting the most of our sunny days.

Summer can also be a great time to upgrade your home’s exterior features so you can also spend time recreating at your home with neighbors, family, and friends. Because the warmer, dryer weather, and longer days permit you to stay outdoors more, you can complete home improvement projects that you may not so easily do in colder, darker, or wetter months.

Here are a few fun summertime home improvement project ideas. As always, let us know how we can help you complete them, whether it’s a trim paint touchup or an exterior full house repaint.

Create an Outdoor Relaxation Space

Picture a beautiful patio made of pavers and a firepit with comfortable outdoor seating. Add to that a pergola and some tall hedges and other landscaping and you can create a space where you and your visitors spend many hours with a glass of wine or a cup of cocoa, sipping away and talking throughout the night.

Of course, the firepit may be most utilized during cooler evenings, but the firepit can also provide a social circle of marshmallow roasting and s’mores making during all seasons of the year.

Install Solar Lighting to Your Walkways and Other Areas

Homes feel more inviting when their exterior is well-lit. Providing visitors the ability to see where they’re going when they come to your house at dusk gives them a warm, impressive welcome, plus adds to your home’s safety.

Install a New Deck or Paint or Stain Your Existing Deck

If your current deck is beyond repair or you want to add a deck where one doesn’t exist, summertime is a great time to either take on the project yourself or hire a trusted local professional to build a deck for you.

These days, there are lots of options to use as the material to build your deck. Where there used to be only pressure-treated wood decks, now you have cedar wood, exotic woods, and molded plastic, also known as composite wood. Each has its advantages and disadvantages, and can be cleaned, stained, or painted using the right products.

If your current deck needs to be refreshed with a new coat of stain or paint, you can complete that task in the summer as long as you watch for errant rainy days that may spoil your deck’s new finish. We’re happy to help you with the paint and stain selection for your decking, as well as to recommend sanding and other prep techniques.

Insulate, Seal, or Dehumidify Your Crawlspace

People are paying more attention to their crawlspaces, providing benefits to their home’s health. Among the benefits of sealing, insulating, and dehumidifying your crawlspace are keeping your foundation strong and controlling mold and mildew growth.

Paint Your Doors, Shutters, or Both

If your home’s exterior paint is in good condition and you want to enhance your home’s curb appeal, painting your home’s front door is an easy, relatively inexpensive project you can do. Painting or staining the shutters a matching or complementary shade will add beauty to your home’s curb appeal. Note that updating your shutters may be best done by a painting professional because of the complexity of the project.

Either way, completing this project in the summer gives you sufficient time to completely dry the surfaces in between cleaning, priming, and painting.

Summertime is a great time of year whether you’re playing, working, or making improvements to your home. You’ll reap the benefits all year round from doing any one of these or other summer home improvement projects.

We’re here and happy to help you any way we can. We’ve been painting Pierce and Thurston County homes for over 40 years and we look forward to serving you! Reach out to our Flying Colors Painting team to discuss your home improvement project and to get a free estimate!